Over the years numerous branch-and-bound procedures for solving the resource-constrained project scheduling problem (RCPSP) have been developed. Enumerating delaying alternatives, extension alternatives, feasible posets, feasible sequences, feasible completion times or feasible subsets, they all...

It is well-known that for many project scheduling problems the Space AS of active schedules contains at least one optimal solution for each feasible instance, so restricting heuristic construction methods to AS will improve algorithmic efficiency without foresaking the chance to eventually find...

Gegenstand der vorliegenden Arbeit sind zwei praktisch und theoretisch bedeutsame Probleme, die bei just-in-time orientierter Variantenfließfertigung auftreten. Ein Problem besteht darin, den Teilebedarf in der Endmontage so konstant wie möglich zu halten ("Level Scheduling Problem"). Das...

Resource-constrained project scheduling under a net present value objective attracts growing interest. Because this is an NP-hard problem, it is unlikely that optimum solutions can be computed for large instances. Thus, heuristics have become a popular research field. Up to now, however, tight...

Numerous exact algorithms have been developed for solving the resource-constrained project scheduling problem. Experimental studies have shown that currently even projects with only 60 activities cannot be optimally solved within a reasonable amount of time. Therefore heuristics employing...

This paper introduces a new general framework for genetic algorithms to solve a broad range of optimization problems. When designing a genetic algorithm, there may be several alternatives for a component such as crossover, mutation or decoding procedure, and it may be difficult to determine the...

This paper considers two problem classes that are important to researchers as well as practitioners, namely packing and project scheduling problems. First, the two problem categories are described. This includes a classification of packing problems as well as of project scheduling concepts....

The staff scheduling problem in the retail business is considered for which a new mathematical model and new solution methods are introduced. The problem is formalized as a set covering type problem. Columns represent feasible weekly working time patterns of one sales clerk. Rows correspond to...

For most computationally intractable problems there exists no heuristic that is equally effective on all instances. Rather, any given heuristic may do well on some instances but will do worse on others. Indeed, even the 'best' heuristics will be dominated by others on at least some subclasses of...

In this paper an improved set of benchmark instances for the simple assembly line balancing problem is presented. The benchmark set currently available consists of instances with 7 to 297 tasks to be executed. Although claims made in the literature state that instances with up to 1000 tasks can...